Consumer Products Sales and Marketing: Don’t Let Showrooming Dampen Your Holiday Season

Think that Showrooming applies just to retailers? Think again.

Savvy consumer products sales and marketing teams are getting ahead of this here-to-stay consumer buying phenomenon to ensure that the showrooming grinch doesn’t steal their holiday cheer — and their best sales of the year.

Although showrooming is frequently defined as evaluating a product in a bricks-and-mortar store and then completing the purchase online at a lower price, showrooming has expanded to also include purchasing competitors’ products or product substitutes instead. Simply stated, this means that consumer products companies are becoming just as vulnerable to showrooming as their retailer partners are.

Taking into consideration that margins to consumer products companies for their goods sold online are frequently much thinner than the margins they receive from bricks-and-mortar retailers, showrooming packs a 1-2-punch that hits consumer products sales and marketing teams from all sides.

But if you act quickly, there is still time this holiday season to launch a promotional and retail execution plan that will warm even the coldest grinch’s heart — and deliver an engaging in-store consumer experience that will boost your wins at the shelf.

Watch the Consumer Goods Technology webcast replay ‘Showrooming: Manage the Impact to Maximize Brand Loyalty’. You’ll learn how showrooming can dampen your consumer products sales if you don’t take action — along with 10 Retail Execution Tips to help you combat the showrooming grinch this holiday season.

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Ariane Lindblom is Senior Director, Sales Line of Business, SAP Global. Follow Ariane on Twitter @arianelindblom.